Cross Country Weekly Roundup #2

Ben Fogg kicks in the third leg to help Lake Braddock win the boys’ race at the Braddock Relays. Photo: Charlie Ban

Laid end-to-end, the races by the scoring five of a cross country team would stretch 15.5 miles.

As cool as that would be, it would take forever, so the Braddock Relays cuts it in half, gives the runners and atmosphere otherwise saved for high school football games and pits the teams against one another, one runner at a time.

Each 2500 meter leg wound around Lake Braddock’s athletic fields and part of a parking lot before an exchange zone on the track.

Ron Kronlage has brought his J.E.B. Stuart team here for several years.

“The kids love the atmosphere, it’s a lot of fun and a nice change from running 5k races every week,” he said.

He leant his strategy for planning out the 5×2.5k relay lineup: “In some races, I’d want veterans running first and last, but my team’s not as competitive as these other teams. We’re among the last place, so we want to give our kids something to fight for as long as possible.”

So the lineup ends up following the team’s finishing order from other, traditional, races.

“The downside of that is, you get to the last leg, you have a runner who is overmatched,” he said. “For that last leg, you want someone with a lot of strength and determination there. not necessarily the fastest runner, but someone who has a competitive streak.”

Lake Braddock won both championship titles, with senior AlexCorbett recording the fastest leg in the boys’ race and Robinson senior LaurenBerman hitting the fastest in the girls’ race.

George Marshall coach Darrell General opted to put his inexperienced runners, two freshman years, in the two leadoff spots to make sure they’d have people to run with, then relying on his more experienced runners’ confidence to pull them through to the finish.

Meet director and Lake Braddock coach MikeMangan said while it’s hard to extrapolate anything about the teams from the relays, it’s “lots of fun on a kind of off week.”

Elsewhere, several Mongtomery County teams opened their season in earnest at the Track n’ Trail Invitational in Elkton, where T.S. Wootton’s boys, led by senior and individual winner PatrickMunro, and Bethesda-Chevy Chase, led by winner Nora McUmber, took team crowns.

“I am continuously amazed at B-CC and how good and how deep they are,” Wootton coach KellieRedmond said. “The top 25 medaled at this meet and B-CC had eight of those medals. If CarolineBeakes returns they will only be that much stronger.”

She noted that Quince Orchard’s boys were looking good for the early part of the season and Richard Montgomery’s RohannAsfaw, who finished fourth in 16:25, is likely coming back from a hip injury, setting him up for a strong postseason as his recovery continues.

In Virginia, Oakton went to the Knights Crossing Invitational in Salem and lost handily to Blacksburg, which dominated the race with three ahead of Oakton’s first.

“They’re likely still the cream of the crop team in our area,” said West Springfield coach ChrisPellegrini. “Lake Braddock girls are starting to sharpen up and gain a little bit on Oakton.

“Robinson boys are very underrated, and look like a team that is top four or so in the area,” he added. “Oakton boys are unspectacular, but are still running extremely well. They haven’t lost a step despite graduating a number of top athletes from last year.”

I’m still gathering results to update how our preseason All-RunWashington team did. If you know and want to speed up the discovery process for runners marked “inconclusive,” email [email protected]